just thought i would share this... steve l. sent me the philadelphia one... it's a #420! thought i would share it along with my other #420 from chicago. thank you so much steve!!!
Looking good, Brant. Heres an article I found on the Mystic Stamp website. U.S. #420 Series of 1912-14 30¢ Franklin Issue Date: April 1914 Printed by: Bureau of Engraving and Printing Method: Flat plate Watermark: Single line Perforation: 12 Color: Orange red To avoid confusion among postal clerks, officials decided to picture George Washington on all Series of 1912-14 denominations of 7¢ or lower. Denominations of 8¢ and above pictured Benjamin Franklin. When the Post Office Department issued the 1908 series, there were not enough different color inks for each denomination. Therefore, various shades of each color were used. For example, the 1¢ and 8¢ were both printed in green, and the 3¢ and 50¢ in purple, and the 5¢ and 15¢ in blue. Postal clerks complained that the stamps were too similar, making them difficult to distinguish, especially if they were in a hurry. In addition, the poor artificial lights hindered their ability to differentiate between the subtle shades. Experiments were conducted using different inks printed on colored paper. These tests, however, determined this was not an effective solution to the problem. Finally, it was decided that the series should simply be split in half. The first seven stamps in the series (1¢ – 7¢) carried the portrait of the Father of our Country, while the remaining stamps (8¢ – $1) pictured our first postmaster general. The stamps bearing Benjamin Franklin’s picture were given a new border design, which like the previous one, was simple, yet artistic. The stamps were printed on single line watermarked paper, except for the 50¢ and $1 denominations. When the change was made to the single line watermark, the Bureau still had a small supply of double line watermarked paper on hand. Since the demand for these stamps was small, they decided to use the leftover paper to print the high-value denominations.
So this is a precancel from Cincinnati Ohio. Not like the Kansas, Nebraska, Hawaii or Molly Pitcher over print that I though it was. I was too busy with my cataloging my Australian collection I forgot about this one I have. but following the thread I said that looks very familiar to me.
tom, i love your precancel! i don't have that one in my collection. i have 2 #899s... chicago and elgin, illinois.
I have a few precancels from that series swish and some on the Washington/Franklin issues also. My Wash/Franks are in no order as of yet..
Nice looking stamps. Will look at my collection to see if I have even one with precancel and will post it here.
I just recently sent almost all my precancels to Ratio411 in trade for some stuff but I think there was at least 100 of them. I didn't realize how many people collected those! Looks real time consuming and arduous to get all the towns, varieties, etc... Is there separate albums meant for them? Just kind of curious as to what a precancel collection looks like?
the precancel stamp society has some pre-made pages you can download for free. personally, i collect my own way, not the "traditional" way, so i just use stock pages. http://www.precancels.com/wordpress/?page_id=195
